Cars are essentially extensions of ourselves, like magical "feet" that get us to and fro. Cars are a cultural and status symbol, whether your agenda is saving the world (Prius), you're trying to economize (Hyundai), you appreciate longevity (Honda), or you're scared of the Apocalypse (Hummer). The reason there are so many different types of cars is because so many different types of people; and with that I give you car accessories and customization.

Before you even purchase a car you consider its' accessories; such as a TV to shut you kids up or tinted windows to hide your blunts. Now if you have the perfect family you may think of the stick figure family decal a selling point thus allowing you to rub it in all single parent, divorcée, widower, old spinster, and non-traditionalists' faces. The same cannot be said for any woman test driving any car with "panty dropper" across the front, unless she is a lesbian who has to pee a lot. Men on the other hand may love this, along with the sexy female figures adorning 18 wheeler truck flaps or a fuzzy thong covering their spoiler.

It is common, especially in the south, for men to want testosterone to radiate from their truck, Truck Nuts are an option. These are an ultra classy pair of fake rubber testicles designed to hang from a vehicles boat hitch. Where not only can your truck grow a pair, it's passed puberty too, to grow it's very own mustache and 5 clock shadow. There is a mirage of masculinity in the redneck road world. Gun racks for both outside and inside your ride, along with fake arms and legs to hang out your trunk. You also have the childish cartoon decal of Calvin & Hobbes pissing either blindly into air or onto something, ranging from my-ex to city boys, as well incorporating motifs involving the IRS, sports teams, Bin Laden, Obama, and other car manufactures such as Ford and VW.

But wait, don't blow you wad it on fuzzy dice, consider overcompensating in other ways such as antique cars, hydraulics, rims, spinners, Lamborghini doors, 14 karat gold paint job, neon lights, custom murals and interiors. Such as Snoop Dog's Laker Magic 1967 Pontiac Parisienne donning brilliant yellow leather seats and a glowing facade featuring a airbrushed murals of the Lakers equipped with Snoop uniformed as #20. A lot can be attributed to the Chevy Impala, you have Dr. Dre,Tupac, Young Jeezy, and Curren$y rocking the old school models. But let's not forget Justin Bieber's Audi R8 Cheetah print chariot he sashayed into Selena Gomez's 21st Birthday on, and Miley's missing Maserati. 50 Cent featured a Saleen S7 in his video, while Rick Ross raised him an Aston Martin and Roll's Royce, but TI's custom 1939 Lincoln-Zephyr with suicide doors killed it. The most practicals of all pimp rides is the lowrider truck, which you can fill to the brim with diamonds, but can barely conquer a speed bump. My prediction of for a revival of the Chevy Nova or El Caminio convertible equipped with a gun rack, Jacuzzi, transparent under-lite hood, spinners, suicide doors, a mural of the Modern Family, french fry holder, and of course a boat hitch with Truck Nuts.

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LAJ

100 Objects of Popular and Material Culture is an blog exploring the manifestations of human consumption and commodity-ization. The purpose of this experiment is to explore material and popular culture in contemporary society by using objects and concepts to prompt wider questions and reflections. So by emulating The British Museum's and Neil MacGregor's format of A History of the World in 100 Objects I plan to satirically analyze and reinterpreted 100 material culture objects over the course of 2014. Material Culture is the study of our culture's consumption of stuff; namely the manifestation of culture through material productions where people's perceptions of objects is socially and culturally dependent. With this, objects reflect conscious and unconscious beliefs on the the individuals who fabricated, purchased, or used them, and by extension the society where they live. So examining materiality, cultural truths and societal assumptions may be discovered. As anthropologist Arjun Appaduai states "in any society the individual is often caught between the cultural structure of commodity-ization and his own personal attempts to bring a value and order to the universe of things." Objects and commodities make up a much larger symbolic system consisting of want and need, socio-economic status, fashion, etc. Often times form follows function whether the commodity, market, and or consumer forever evolve around one-another. Philosopher Pierre Bourdieu's theories of capital flow full circle; where regardless if you are a minimalist or a hoarder the world is made up of things and everyone will leave their footprint on the earth. So by humorously analyzing marketed objects and concepts, hopefully this blog will provide further incite into ideas of over-consumption, a disposable society, consumerism vs. anti-consumers, planned obsolescence vs. sustainability, as well as the greater good of mankind and future generations.